Oracle: The Cure
-127. This follows Bedard's Platinum Flats storyline, and is followed by Bryan Miller's work with Oracle on Batgirl Rising and Gail Simone's Birds of Prey storyline Endrun. Prior to the series' debut, based on the title it was speculated that Oracle would find a cure for her paralysis and regain use of her legs. However, the title The Cure is a reference to Calculator's attempts to cure his children using the Anti-Life Equation. Barbara does later regain use of her legs and become Batgirl again in Gail Simone's 2011 storyline The Darkest Reflection. Synopsis In the wake of Batman's disappearance, Barbara Gordon is still moving into her new apartment and dealing with phantom leg pains. Having dinner with her father Jim Gordon, he is able to tell she is clearly distracted. The Calculator visits his comatose daughter Wendy in the hospital and tells her that he's working on something new. It's revealed that the Calculator has been trying to put the Anti-Life Equation back together since Final Crisis and is mathematically inscribing the values into diamonds he can wield. Oracle's hacker friend Cheese-Fiend inadvertently gives him the last fragment in an MMORPG called Alta Viva, and Cheese-Fiend's head explodes in real life from exposure to the Equation. Traveling to Hong Kong, Barbara lets her guard down and gets mugged although she brutally beats the three potential rapists down even out of her wheelchair. It's explained that the Calculator believes he can harness the Equation's power to restore life, using it to heal his daughter and resurrect his son. Barbara teams up with a group of advanced hackers in Hong Kong who are mapping the entire internet as a research project, and uses their system to physically enter the net. Calculator's plans to mine data for the Equation inside Alta Viva are interrupted by another of Oracle's hacker friends Chaos Larry, and Oracle is forced to directly intervene or Calculator will kill him. Chaos Larry is hospitalized in real life, and Oracle contacts the creator of Alta Viva to help her enter the game as an avatar. Inside the game, she battles Calculator's avatar and shoves the Anti-Life Equation down his throat, infecting him with a version of the Equation in real life. Desperately, Calculator returns to visit his daughter Wendy in the hospital and Barbara arrives to stop him from infecting her as well. When he attacks her, she beats him down from her wheelchair and has him dragged away by the police. It's explained that his infection makes him unable to use electronic devices without Oracle being able to pinpoint his location immediately, effectively barring Calculator from the internet. Wendy wakes up from her coma and is horrified to realize that she can't feel her own legs and has become paralyzed from the waist down. | Issues = * * * | Vehicles = | Items = | Weapons = | Notes = | Trivia = * They have been nemeses for a long time over the internet, but this storyline is the first meeting of Calculator and Oracle in person using their civilian identities. | RecommendedReading = | Links = }} Category:Birds of Prey Storylines